


Gone to Vinegar

by cofax



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-12
Updated: 2014-09-12
Packaged: 2018-02-17 02:10:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2293073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cofax/pseuds/cofax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Susan has hardly spoken since Boris opened the door to Lucy's room, with its shattered windowpanes and Father Christmas's gifts abandoned on the torn bedclothes.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gone to Vinegar

**Author's Note:**

  * For [janetimothyfreeman](https://archiveofourown.org/users/janetimothyfreeman/gifts).



There was, thank the Lion, mud at the ford across the Glasswater, and pressed clearly into that rich brown mud were the tracks of nine horses. "Eight horses and a mule," corrected Anetha, after a prolonged sniff. 

"And?" prodded Susan. Bell stamped one hoof under her, and twitched her tail, but said nothing.

Anetha looked up at Susan, and a lip curled up to show one snow-white canine. "And your sister, and that false-hearted young lord."

Confirmation at last. Two other parties had set out at the same time, but One-Eye had been sure that Lucy and Lord Enric were with this smallest group. 

Susan didn't say anything, and barely needed to shift her weight before Bell plunged into the cold and fast-running waters of the creek. The water was high: in early spring snow was still thick on the high mountain meadows, and Susan was soaked to the knee before Bell drove up the opposite bank.

Overhead, a Raven cried out, and Susan raised an arm in response. As the Raven circled down, the rest of Susan's troop splashed out of the ford and up the bank behind her. She hadn't brought many with her--truth be told, there weren't many to bring--and she'd had to move fast, so her entire entourage consisted of one Centaur, two of the Great Cats of the castle guard, and Anetha, who said she was a Wolf but had the broad shoulders and heavy jaws of a mastiff. Bringing up the rear were Bell's sister Dee, and Lucy's mare Daisy, who wasn't a Talking Beast but was despite that as sturdy and sensible a mount as any in Narnia.

"How far behind are we, Bird?" bellowed Stormswift at the Raven. A burly gray Centaur with spotted hindquarters, he mostly spoke in a bellow, and consequently served as the trainer for new archers. 

One-Eye the Raven was undisturbed, and as Susan urged Bell to a canter along the little-used trail, he said to her, "Some hours, my queen, and they are moving fast."

It was late afternoon, the chill days of early spring still short. Susan cast an eye at the westering sun, settled deeper into her saddle, and closed her mind to everything but the chase. There would be time enough for worry once she'd caught up.

 

****

+~+~+

_Everything smells of horse, and wool, and dust. It's dark, and stiflingly hot, her cheeks and hands rubbing against rough material, while the world spins as she bounces. At every step the horse's spine jams into her belly, and it feels as though it's been going on for hours._

_Hours, which means she's far away from Cair Paravel, and she panics at the thought, her chest tightening and her thoughts going even more foggy. She fights it off; she must be ready to escape on her own, for surely no one from the castle can know where she is--if they did, she would be free by now._

_Aslan, give me strength , she whispers in her mind, and tries not to choke on the rag thrust into her mouth._

 

****

+~+~+

Susan and Lucy had argued yesterday, of course. It was what they did these days: these days of worry and short rations, with the winter's stores running low and this year's crops not yet in the ground. Piling fear on top of hunger, the northern Giants had crossed the border to raid the Centaurs' flocks and uproot oak saplings, and Galman pirates had raided the south coast three times since the harvest. 

Peter was in the north, with most of the army and a third of the Cair Paravel guard. And, over Susan's objections, Edmund had taken another third to Anvard in order to strategize with Lune regarding the pirates. Susan suspected he was simply desperate to get away from the cold, damp castle and his ever-squabbling sisters. What little was left of the army spent their strength on patrols of the southern coastline.

This time, the argument started when Lucy announced she would not attend the evening's dinner for the Rhidian Ambassador, but had a previous engagement with several Fauns to celebrate the Spring Moon. Susan had pointed out that without an agreement to graze on the Rhidian side of the border, the Centaurs might well lose the spring lambs, and the presence of both queens would honor the Ambassador. Lucy had said--well, to be honest, Susan hadn't paid attention to what Lucy had said, because she was simultaneously reviewing Peter's latest message on the situation on the border, and getting her hair put up for the dinner. Whatever Lucy said, Susan had replied with something over-critical about the state of Lucy's dress, Lucy had snapped something in return, and then Varus had interrupted with a letter from Lord Brightwing. Susan had stopped paying attention to Lucy altogether, and hadn't noticed when she left Susan's chambers. 

They had been sniping at each other for months, and the arrival of the Rhidian embassy had merely made things worse. Diplomacy and impetuousness rarely made good bedfellows, Susan would admit in her wiser moments. But it didn't make it easier to live together in the sometimes-constrained confines of Cair Paravel.

She was therefore surprised when Lucy appeared at the dinner anyway, dressed in a fine burgundy gown with no stains on it that Susan could see. And gratified when Lucy danced (twice!) with the Ambassador's aide, a freckled young man with beautiful green eyes and an unfortunate sneer. 

"Poor Enric," the Ambassador said to Susan as they watched the dancers. The elderly woman tapped her foot a bit in time with the music. "His grandfather gambled away the family estates, you know, and the young man has a fixation about restoring the family's fortunes. Of course, it is quite a respectable family--third cousins to the Queen, I believe--but he has rather an inflated idea of his own importance." 

So seeing Lucy dancing with the over-proud but impoverished youth, and smiling stiffly the way Lucy did when forced to engage in diplomacy, was reassuring. Lucy might not enjoy these formal occasions, but she knew her duty to her family, and to Narnia. Susan smiled, and nodded approvingly.

By morning, Lucy was gone.

 

****

+~+~+

_At length, when the discomfort has graduated into generalized misery, the horse comes to a halt, and she hears several voices, muffled through her wrappings._

_When the covering is drawn away, the sudden light hurts her eyes, but she can't raise her hand to shade them, and turns her head instead, blinking. She kneels with her hands and feet bound, surrounded by armed men. Humans. Not Narnians, then, which she finds the strength to be grateful for, even on her knees in the mud._

_"Well, princess?" asks a familiar voice, in a mocking tone. "You'll give me your smiles now, I'll warrant. And more."_

 

****

+~+~+

Some miles further on, the forest opened into woody glades; at one such, Anetha checked suddenly, and cast off the trail, nose to the ground. Susan said nothing; she had hardly spoken since Boris had opened the door to Lucy's room, with its shattered windowpanes and Father Christmas's gifts abandoned on the torn bedclothes. 

She had been _gratified_ when Lucy danced with him. 

Anetha made one last pass around the open area, and returned to Susan, her eyes bright. "She lives, Your Majesty. I smelt no blood on her, and little fear."

Dee spoke for the first time. "She will be angry, though." She shook her head, teeth bared to the brisk wind.

"Aye, she will," agreed Stormswift, and the stamp of his hind foot echoed through the trees. "Best we find them before she does him an injury she may regret."

For the first time since she woke that morning, Susan smiled, painfully. She imagined Lucy on the training ground, staff in her hand and her legs planted as if they had grown from the earth, a glint in her eye. "Indeed."

 

****

+~+~+

_She stares, in astonishment more than fear, at the young man she danced with only hours before. He tried to be charming as they turned and spun about the banqueting hall, but he is not charming now. His lip curls as he stares at her, and his eyes gleam as he takes in her disheveled appearance, dressed as she is for sleeping in a short tunic and an old pair of Edmund's breeches. (As emergencies in Cair Paravel have an unhappy tendency to occur after midnight, Lucy never sleeps in anything in which she cannot run or fight.)_

_He took her out of her very bed, she realizes, though her memory of the previous evening is hazy. He took her from her chambers, which are guarded, and from the castle itself. Whom did he hurt, or kill, to make his escape? Susan, she thinks, with a flash of fear, or Jethard, who should have guarded her door that night. But she will not give him the pleasure of asking, she decides, with an anger that goes deeper than the fear._

_As one of his men removes the gag, she takes the opportunity to look about her. Four men-at-arms, two extra horses, and one pack mule. From the speed with which the guards are eating, it's clear they don't mean to stop for more than a few minutes. Nor is their destination close by, with the amount of gear loaded on the mule._

_When the gag is out, she coughs, her mouth dry, musty-tasting. Another guard, an older man with a grizzled beard, gives her a drink of water, and she nods gratefully, but says nothing._

_"Not so haughty now, princess?" says Lord Enric of Kellastin, and Lucy jerks up her head to glare at him. He smirks at her, and two of his men shuffle uncomfortably. "Your sister would have been better--she at least acts as a women ought--but I don't need a war, just a wife. Your brother the king, I'm sure, will be glad to have such an unwomanly creature off his hands."_

_Her first thought is that, like so many others from outside Narnia, he simply cannot understand that Narnia has two queens and two kings. She was crowned by Aslan himself; she is not a princess!_

_Her second thought, once she realizes what he said, is sheer astonishment. Lion's Mane, the man plans to marry me?_

 

****

+~+~+

Stormswift set a fast pace through the afternoon, although they were forced to slow as the light died. "How fare you, dear heart?" whispered Susan to Bell, as the mare slipped in yet another muddy patch of ground. 

"I am good for some distance yet, my Queen," responded Bell, her voice stronger than Susan had expected. "When we catch them, you should move to Dee, for she is fresh and a better fighter than I."

At length, it was full dark, and Susan reluctantly reined Bell in. While there should have been a moon, it was overcast, and even if it were clear, the trees were thick enough to block most of its light. "We must rest," she said, as her people gathered about her. "We will not help Lucy if we arrive exhausted, or miss some trick of Enric's to throw us off the trail."

Anetha, though, shook her head. "I see well enough, your Majesty, and can scent their trail. They will not lose me."

"Well enough, good Wolf," said Susan, "but we must still rest for a few hours. Your strength may be infinite, but mine, at least, is not."

She ate and drank standing, until Stormswift stood over her and forced her to lay down on a blanket. "If we exhaust ourselves, we shall lose them, queen. Rest, and rise refreshed." 

 

****

+~+~+

_Someone is following them, Lucy is sure. She has seen the same Raven four times now, although he has never come close enough to speak to her. She's not sure Enric realizes this, although he's pushing the party and their horses hard. The horses are sweating, the mule balky; the walks between trots are getting longer and longer._

_At least she's not hanging head-down over the saddle anymore, which cannot have been any more comfortable for her mount than it was for Lucy. Despite her bound hands, she leans forward and gives the mare a consoling pat. Enric glares at her, and Lucy just smiles at him; her silence enrages him, and angry men make mistakes. Good._

_After sunset, they slow, and at length one of the guards dismounts and leads them on foot through the moonless dark. Enric, of course, will not walk, although his weight is clearly a burden on his horse. Lucy dozes, swaying in the saddle. It is a dreamlike, desperate time: the creak of leather, the soft thump of horses' hooves, and the quiet voices of the guards follow her into and out of sleep until she cannot tell one state from the other._

_At length they stop, and fling themselves down for a short, uncomfortable rest on the hard ground. Lucy is bound hand and foot, and surrounded by guards; she rests reluctantly and falls asleep thinking of how she might escape come morning. In her sleep, she hears hoofbeats, and wakes with hope in her heart._

_Today, she thinks as she is boosted into the saddle;  it will be today._

 

****

+~+~+

Susan slept poorly, her head cushioned on Panthea's soft underbelly, and woke several times to stare at the dark sky. Just as Anetha nosed her awake, she remembered what Lucy had said in her dressing room that evening. "But I don't like them, and the Ambassador's aide keeps _looking_ at me."

Susan couldn't remember her response, probably something like, "Maybe he's just appalled by your disgraceful condition." No wonder Lucy had been so angry.

An hour after dawn, they found the camp where the kidnappers rested during the night. "We're catching up," reported Anetha, after nosing about for a few minutes. "And their horses are tired, I can smell the sweat on them."

"As are ours," noted Susan dryly. But she weighed less than any man, even armed and armored as she was, and was able to switch from Dee to Bell without either mare breaking stride. 

Dee tossed her head. "We are still strong enough to catch these evil men!" 

Panthea nodded her heavy golden head in agreement, and yawned widely, showing her glossy canines. "I wish to meet these men who struck down Jethard." Leopards do not smile like humans, but if they could, she would be smiling nastily. 

"On, then," ordered Susan. "Faster now, before they reach the hills."

 

****

+~+~+

_This is quiet country, and they see no Talking Beasts or other wise Narnians. But Lucy has traveled Narnia in every season, in company with Fauns, Horses, and Bears, and she knows where she is: Rosegreen Forest, south and west of Beruna. They are less than a day's ride north of the Archenland border, but she can see from the sun they are bearing west._

_Enric cannot hope to hide her in Archenland, nor find allies: they must be heading for Telmar. And if they cross the border--if they even can cross the border, in this season with the snow still so deep in the high passes--there is little hope she will ever see Cair Paravel, or her siblings, again._

_The trails they have been following are narrow and seldom-traveled, yet after two hours they turn suddenly west and onto an even narrower track. It runs straight for some while and then begins to climb a wooded hillside, twisting back and forth across the steep incline. The horses, weary as they are, struggle on the rough and narrow path, their shod hooves striking sparks off the stones. Below them, the hillside drops away steeply for several hundred yards, ending in a rushing creek full of snowmelt._

_"There's someone behind us!" cries one of the guards, and Lucy nearly falls off the mare as she turns in the saddle to look._

_He's right: far down the slope behind them, she catches a glimpse of something moving in the trees. It's tall: a Minotaur, maybe, or a Centaur. Stormswift, perhaps: he was left behind as acting captain of the guard when Sharpeye escorted Edmund to Anvard._

_But there's no time to look more closely, for Enric seizes her lead rein and yanks her horse forward. He spurs his mount cruelly, driving them both up the narrow trail, kicking stones behind them to clatter against the other horses' legs._

_This climb is long, and if Lucy remembers correctly, it comes out near the foot of the pass into Telmar. Enric could still escape._

_But not if Lucy can stop him. She has no weapons but her body, but her feet are loose, and that might be enough._

 

****

+~+~+

Susan chewed her lip in frustration. If Enric reached the top of the ridge before she caught up, he could split his party and disappear into the forest on the plateau. He could still escape into Telmar with Lucy.

But Aslan would not desert her now. Susan looked down at Panthea, who loped along the narrow track with no apparent difficulty. "How fast are you, sister Leopard?"

"Not as fast as Jethard," replied Panthea, with an amused twitch of her ears. "But I could catch yon blackguard before he clears the hill."

"Better," said Susan, "get ahead of him and block his way. Frighten his horses, if you can."

" _That_ will be a pleasure." And the Leopard was off, leaping off the track and into the trees in two breaths. In five breaths she was out of sight.

Stormswift rumbled approval, and pull his spear from its sling on his back. "Now, my friends and cousins. The last dash, and show your anger, for so we might frighten them out of fighting us. Aslan will thank us for sparing even these faithless lives."

 

****

+~+~+

_All she needs is a distraction, and just as she thinks she might have to create one herself, Aslan provides._

_There is a flurry and a flash of gold-and-black. Enric cries out, yanking his horse to a stop on the steep track. Crouched at the top of the rise, Lucy sees a Leopard: Panthea, from the notch in her right ear._

_When Panthea snarls, Lucy's mount crabs and kicks. Enric's stallion swerves and backs, trying to get away from Panthea's terrifying teeth, and Enric drops the lead rein. He swears viciously at the stallion, digging his spurs in, but the horse fights him--it wants nothing but to flee from this terrible cat._

_Shouts rise behind them, too garbled for words, but Lucy knows the meaning: the Narnians have caught up to the Rhidian rear. In the chaos of the moment, she could easily jump off and escape into the trees, but that is not what she means to do._

_Her hands are bound, but her feet are free. She leans forward over the mare's sweaty neck. "Now, my friend," she says, soft and low into one twitching ear. One touch of her heels, and--thank the Lion--the mare moves reluctantly up the trail, approaching Enric's nervous stallion._

_Close enough, Lucy thinks, and stiff but still limber, manages to get her feet under her and onto the saddle. The stallion is still bouncing around, but Panthea has not approached closer, and this is about as good a chance as Lucy is going to get._

_She feels, suddenly, as if she is the still point in a cyclone. Enric is swearing and lashing at his mount with the ends of his reins. Ten yards up the slope, Panthea crouches, snarling and lashing her tail. The wind has picked up, and the trees above them sway gently, pale green tips barely noticeable against the sky._

_Help me, Aslan , she thinks, and leaps._

 

****

+~+~+

When Susan finally arrived at the top of the hill, Dee stepping carefully around the disgruntled Rhidian guards and their nervous mounts, the scene she discovered was one of unexpected tranquility.

Panthea still crouched at the top of the rise. Beyond her, Susan could see clear sky and the tips of trees: Enric had very nearly escaped into the open forest of the plateau. Below the Leopard, Stormswift held the reins of two unsettled horses, a sturdy bay mare and a glossy black stallion. As she watched, Stormswift breathed into the stallion's nostrils, and the horse relaxed immediately.

Between Panthea and Stormswift, Lucy was crouched on the narrow path, her back to Susan. As Susan dismounted and gave Dee a grateful pat on the neck, Lucy swiveled her head around to look at her sister. Now that Susan was on the ground, she had a better view: Enric lay at Lucy's feet, a bloody gash on his forehead and a foul look on his face. At his neck was his own knife, stolen from his belt by Lucy in some audacious attack.

Susan came forward, drawing her own knife, but Lucy waved her back. So Susan squatted, instead, a few feet away, and watched the wild look in Lucy's eyes fade to her normal good cheer.

The wind whispered in the trees, Stormswift rumbled softly to the frightened horses, and Panthea yawned and stretched luxuriously. Susan was suddenly terribly, terribly tired.

"Well," she finally said, into Lucy's silence. "You did tell me you didn't like the way he looked at you."

And Lucy, astonishingly, laughed.

**Author's Note:**

>  _Anger is just love_  
>  left out  
> gone to vinegar  
> \--Dessa, "The Crow"
> 
> Beta by Snacky: many thanks, my friend!


End file.
